Today Is My 3rd Business Anniversary!!!! 3 years ago today, I walked out of the high school classroom to pursue my dream as a photographer. Going from a steady paycheck to the unknown was and is scary.  Most businesses fold within three years, so this is a BIG deal! I am really proud of this milestone. I am still in the middle of my journey and have big hopes for the future. In three years I do not feel I have “arrived,” but I am thankful for where I am. My life is a lot more peaceful and happy than it used to be. I have a lot more clients than when I started and I love each and every one. The best people seem to find me and I’m so glad!

I absolutely LOVE my job. Honestly, people ask me if I get sick of weddings all the time. I don’t think I could ever be sick of weddings! I love what they represent, I love the couples and families I meet, I love that each time I shoot a wedding it is a monumental day for the people I am photographing, and I love photographing pretty things and places!

I also shoot lots of couples and families. I love that too. Spending time getting to know people and helping them feel good about themselves is my favorite activity of all time. The action of creating is great, but helping people see themselves as beautiful and worthy of admiration is greater. 

My grandfather Curtis had no idea when he gave his granddaughter a digital camera at 16 that he was giving her the tool to chase her dreams and to help others.  I am forever grateful for him.

 

This year has been a really good and really hard year. Last summer my parents and three siblings moved to Africa. Yup, they moved at the beginning of July to Uganda. They are missionaries there. Communication is difficult and there have been some hard days of missing them and learning who I am without them.

However, In October 2017 they were given a baby that had been abandoned to take care of…they named him Joe. At Christmas Natraj and I flew to Uganda to visit the family and meet this sweet little guy. My parents are currently in the process of adopting baby Joe, and we hope that next summer he will be officially our brother. That means I will be the oldest of 7 children…and my baby brother is 29 years younger than me! Life is such an adventure! While there, Natraj and I just fell in love with the sweet children at the children’s home where my family lives. It was an experience that certainly impacted us in a big way.

Coming home from that trip was very hard. While we were away my best friend’s husband, Jesse Lee, passed away from cancer. Jesse found out he had cancer just a couple weeks after my family moved and his cancer progressed rapidly. He left behind his wife and three children. He is missed very much and his family is still trying to figure how to do life without him. 

When I came home form Uganda I could not walk because I had terrible pain in my feet and ankles. I ended up in a boot for a chronic sprain until April. It is off and I’m in physical therapy. It never stopped me from doing my work though!

In March of 2018 Natraj and I bought out first house! We moved to Anderson to be closer to his work and we were able to get more house for our money. I am loving this town! We bought a beautiful gray and white bungalow in downtown Anderson SC. It is 120 years old! It has the best sweet tea porch I have ever seen! I am totally in love with it! We are painting and doing a little bit of work on it, but I plan to do a blog post showing it off soon.

As you can see, it has been a year of ups and downs. I wasn’t able to accomplish ALL my goals for this year because well…life happened. I am learning to be kinder with myself and giving grace when it is needed.

Here are my goals for 2018-2019 business year

Personal

·      Finish painting and decorating my house

·      Do yoga and spend time on my sweet tea porch

·      Spend more time with friends and family

·      Learn to relax and make time for it

·      Find a new home church

·      Make friends in Anderson

Business

·      Paint & decorate my office

·      Book 5 more weddings than I did last year

·      Complete all my online business courses 

·      Start doing glamour portraiture, Sue Bryce style!

·      Read 10 more business/motivational books

·      Fine tune my processes

·      Perfect my OCF skillz

 

I am so happy to be on this journey of owning my own business and photographing wonderful people. It just fits. I hope whatever you spend most of your time on brings you so much joy.  If not, let’s chat. Call me!